at how I used to be, I still feel I am the same. I may look 1000 times different but i still feel the same way. I still act the same way, and I still seclude myself away from people. Sure when I want to be around them I do my couple days worth and I’m peopled out for about a couple months or so. It really is hard to break the “fat” mentality. But it’s not jsut the fact that I still have that mentality, I think it also comes down to me feeling happy with my self worth.
I go through long phases of re-evaluating my worth to the world. People that I know don’t really know I feel or think these thoughts. Not even my best friend of 10 years knows I feel this way or think this way. I suppose it sort of a feeling of being ashamed that I think about myself this way because I have this whole different persona in front of people. People see me as strong willed, speak my mind, a comedian, an airhead, but they don’t really know me. I’m not sure if it’s because we are a family that doesn’t talk about our feelings or if it’s something we aren’t supposed to tell people we know for a fear of persecution or looks that they may give you. I mean damn, if people knew what i thought or felt they might call the men with the white jacket to come get me and evaluate my emotional stability.
My family doesn’t talk about a lot of issues. We have this unspoken acknowledgment of what is going on around us. We don’t want to really know how people feel, but we know how they feel without asking so there is no need to talk. It may be because my dad grew up back in the old steel towns in the mountains and men were men and grew up to hold down their feelings because if you shared it was considered feminine. Or maybe it was because my dad was a navy man. He has that military mentality. Or it’s a combination of the two.
My mom is fro the Philippines. She is one of 9 children who all left home at the age of 13 or 14. My mom told me her story of when she left home. She was 13 and left to work for a Chinese family. She was their maid. However, not until a few years ago did she ever give me the full details of how and why she left home. It’s too painful for her to talk about so when she does talk, one can’t help but cry. Like many children of that era (1950′s-70′s), they left home to work. To help support the family. But what my mom finally told me was that her mother in a sense sold her into service. Her mom had 9 children and her dad was just a fisherman. It was hard to feed a family that big, so my mom was pretty much told, you have to go to work. So her mom sold her into service for so many years. The money was given upfront to the her family and my mom left to go work. She was “paid” with shelter and food. But the shelter was the under the kitchen table and slept on a mat of like bamboo and newspaper. There were rats and of course the other maids would sometimes steal from her. My mom lived like this for about a 4-5 years. The only reason she left was because my mom wrote a letter to her sister, who married into money, to her to come and get my mom. My mom was ashamed at what she became so that is why she never asked for her “rich” sister to come get her. But my mom at the time had come down with a horrible bladder infection and her vaginal area had become infected. When my aunt came down from Manila to get my mom, she arrived at the door, paid off my mom’s debt to the family and took her to Manila to basically work it off there. But at least she was family and she did get paid money. My mom was a waitress and also was a go-go dancer. That is how she met my dad. He ported there with the Navy for 2 years, met my mom and married her. When they married they moved here and since that time my mom has not seen her family. It has been over 34 years since she has seen anyone. It’s just too expensive and basically everyone has just spread out. So all my mom has is me, my brother, and my dad. Of course my dad’s extended but as for family, family…it’s just us.
We were never a family of wealth. We lived on $700/month for so many years when my dad was in the Navy, but we never lived like it. MY mom and dad knew how to make us never feel hungry. But after that, my dad got a great job. He made like $70K/year from the 80′s-90′s which was great until he got laid off. He got laid off in the end of 1996-1997 when Clinton started closing down all the military bases. When that happened we started to struggle financially. We have been struggling ever since. Since 2000 we have had 2 houses foreclosed, evicted from one place we rented (only lived there for like 5 months), and struggle to pay our bills.
I think this is the time where my weight really got out of control. Whenever there was stress, i took refuge in food. and boy did I ever take refuge. At the end of high school I was 227 (1996). At my heaviest which was on January 26th(ish) 2008 I weighed 339. Now I am back down to 220ish. But I still have a long ways to go. It is a struggle, but I’m doing it for my brother mostly.
Now here is the part I have never told my parents, friends, or best friend, Yes I am doing it for him, because in the back of my mind, I feel his life is worth more than mine. I look at what he has been through, and no matter hwo horrible his life is with dialysis he doesn’t complain. He lives it to the fullest. He has plans for the future. While I don’t. I don’t think I’ll ever get married. I don’t think I’ll ever have a boyfriend that is up to par of what I want in a man, nor do I feel I am worthy of one. I feel like all I am supposed to do with this life, is just work and support my family financially. My brother is a waiter until he gets a kidney and graduates from college, my mom and dad both disabled and on Social Security. I am the only one working a real job, and am here to pay the bills. This leaves me no money to do what I want to do. I can’t be social because I can’t afford it. I feel horrible about trying to find a boyfriend because I still LIVE at HOME. Not my choice but because I am the supporter. I am supporting the family I was born into not a family i gave BIRTH too. I mean I want to have a child, but what man wants a woman that isn’t independent in the normal societal terms? So my only choice is to have artificial insemination. I feel so embarrassed. I am one of those women that will use the excuse “career was first for so long that now I am left to get pregnant by this” way. It’s all code, for I’m a freaking loser that no one wants me so I will have a baby that I will never know who the father is nor will my baby.
So when I think of this and re-evaluate my life, I see my brother as having this great potential that I never will attain at. I feel that my purpose it so support then give life to my brother. So I don’t fear death at surgery. If it happens, I will be giving life to him, and to others. I am an organ donor, and if this is the only way I can give life, then so be it. DO I want to die,?of course not. Do I accept that this may be my purpose? Yes. But do I talk about how I feel to my family and friends? No.
I just feel more comfortable letting the millions and millions of unknown people in the virtual world know how I feel and maybe the handful that decide to stop on my blog to read.
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